1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to garment packaging and display accessories, and, more particularly, to disposable liner panels for outer garments, such as men's shirts, women's blouses, and the like, which are folded into flat packages for purposes of transportation, storage, and sales display.
2. Description of the Prior Art
It is common practice among manufactueres of men's shirts, women's blouses, and similar outer garments, to package the finished garments for storage and sales display by the retail trade in such a way that the particular garment is folded over and attached to a supporting panel or liner of cardboard. The folded garment is in most cases inserted into a bag or shallow carton of which at least the upper side is transparent, so as to display the front side of the article of clothing.
In the course of folding the garment over its cardboard liner, those portions which overlap each other on the back side of the liner are attached to each other and/or to the liner by means of fastening pins, or by means of flexible clamps, so as to hold the front of the garment even and taut against the cardboard liner. In certain configurations, particularly those using a single-panel liner of dimensions equal to the width of the folded garment, only pins are used as fasteners, the pins being inserted through the fabric of the garment, while some of them are stuck into the cardboard liner itself. These fastening pins must later be removed by the buyer of the garment, when he unpacks it for use. While the removal of the pins from the folded garment entails a certain risk of damage to the garment itself, the pins represent a risk of injury, both at insertion in the factory and at removal after purchase. An additional risk is created by pins which accidentally remain in the garment when it is first worn. Lastly, the process of inserting the pins in the course of the packaging operation is timeconsuming and therefore costly.
In an effort to eliminate at least some of the aforementioned disadvantages, there has already been suggested a multi-panel garment liner consisting of a center panel with laterally attached wing-like panels, two lines of perforations defining longitudinal fold lines between the center panel and the adjoining wing panels. The maximum width of the wing panels of this prior art folding liner is approximately one-half of the width of the center panel. It has further already been suggested that the wing panels may have either parallel sides, or that they may have a tapered shape, with a minimum width at the bottom side of the liner and a maximum width at the top side, which is the collar side of the liner. Such a folding liner is disclosed in the German Auslegeschrift No. 15 60 117.
This prior art folding liner makes it possible to dispense with at least some of the previously necessary fastening pins, as clamps may be used to attach to the wing panels those portions of the garment which are folded around their outer longitudinal edges. Even in cases where all the pins are replaced with such clamps, the latter still require the labor of attaching them at the proper places during assembly and their removal by the buyer, prior to use. These clamps have the additional disadvantage of creating undesirable local folds and wrinkles in the garment.